


Running Away Only Helped His Demons

by artsyspikedhair



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Homelessness, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Self-Hatred, Trans Character, Trans Grantaire, Trans Male Character, Transphobia, Verbal Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-26
Updated: 2015-08-26
Packaged: 2018-04-17 06:48:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4656780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artsyspikedhair/pseuds/artsyspikedhair
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>R's alone and friendless, but he's fine. Really. Then he meets some people just as 'fine' as he is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Running Away Only Helped His Demons

R was fine. Really, he was. Who needs friends when you have food and a place to sleep? That's all that has ever mattered. Another place to spend the night, even if it was just in his car again. As long as he could sleep, he'd be fine. Sleep was when the thoughts leave him alone, when the reality of being alone and friendless in a new city doesn't leave him terrified and full of more self-loathing than before. He knew he shouldn't have stolen the money from his father. He knew he shouldn't have taken the bait, but with the stolen bills in his pocket and his father screaming "You'll never amount to anything, you ungrateful bitch!" he snapped. He hit him, and the last words his father said were "If you're going to be attacking your old man, you can leave. Go on now, go! You were never my daughter anyway." 'Ain't that the truth?' R thought, as he did what he should have done years ago. He left, and now he was living in this godawful city they call Boston with just a thousand dollars in his pocket and a car to sleep in. 

He couldn't sleep this time, and decided to go walking. He parked his car and started walking as the thoughts began plaguing him again. 'Why the hell am I doing this?' he thought, hands balled into fists. All running away did was prove him right. 'I am a weakling, a good-for-nothing coward. Why the hell couldn't I have faked it as a girl for a while longer? What the fuck is wrong with me? Maybe those jerks at school were right. Maybe I should have gone through with it. Become another statistic, what do I care?' He almost walked into a business man who scowled at him, but he was too enraptured in his self-loathing to care. He began to get hungry though and, passing a pizza shop, decided to go in. He had a few dollars in his leather jacket and bought some mozzarella sticks from the tired twenty-something woman behind the counter. _Eponine _ __her name tag said, and R thought it was a weird name. Though he didn't even have a name yet, so he wasn't one to talk. He sat down at a two person table while he waited for his number to be called to collect his order. He was feeling guilty about taking a table that could be used by two people. 'There's nothing I can do about it.' he rationalized, and hearing his number, walked over to the counter and grabbed his mozzarella sticks. Glaring at nothing in particular, he threw out the marinara sauce. He hated tomatoes. As he sat back down, a blonde teenager in a red felt coat walked in and bought an entire pizza, paying with a crumpled twenty.__

"Hosting another meeting, E?" Eponine asked, clearly knowing the person.

Yep. We'll only take up one table this time, I promise." The kid seemed apologetic. 

"I don't mind, kid. These meetings are the highlight of my week." She handed him his pizza and his change.

The teenager held his pizza and walked over to the tables pushed together to make a foursome, which just so happened to be near R. R had looked at the kid and immediately thought 'Fuck. That is a really good looking boy. I wonder if I'll ever be that good looking.' As he took a bite of his mozzarella stick, the meaner voice in his head said 'Shut up R, you know you're going to be stuck looking like a ugly girl for the rest of your life. Even if you do get to transition, you'll still be skinny and acne filled and stuck with that scar and nobody will ever love you.' The mean voice sounded remarkably similar to his father, which R always hated. That man even took over his thoughts. It sickened him, and what sickened him worse is that he believed the voice was right. He was ugly and worthless. He was trying to block the voice out when a group of four students walked in. One of them was wearing a dress and had a rainbow flag sticking out of their backpack, so R assumed they were not the type of people that would beat him up if he had to take a piss, though he wasn't certain of his judgement. 

The kid with the pizza beckoned his friends over. "Courfeyrac!" He cried, hugging the kid in the dress. "I'm so glad you could make it! And Combeferre, always nice to see you!" He shook hands with a boy in black glasses that almost matched his eyes. "Who are your friends?"

"This is Jehan." The kid called Courfeyrac said, gesturing toward a girl with long hair dressed in all floral and a paisley tie. "And that is the Eagle." Combeferre added, gesturing toward a bald kid in an Avenger's shirt, who nodded.

The blonde kid realized they were all standing but him and told the group to sit, then got up and walked over to R. "May I take this chair?" he asked R, and R was so enraptured in staring at the new people he didn't respond. "Excuse me?" the kid tried again.

"What?" R asked, slightly confused as to why the unfairly good looking boy was talking to him. He mentally berated himself for sounding so rude.

"May I borrow this chair? My friend Combeferre doesn't have a place to sit and you have the last chair available."

"Uh, sure." R replied, then asked "Are you having a meeting?" before he could stop himself. 'What are you doing?!?' The mean voice in his head screamed. 'You're too pathetic to be talking to this guy. This perfect guy who will never love you.' 

"Yeah. We're having a meeting type thing. It's really more of a club." The boy said, unsure of how much to reveal to this stranger. 

"'Kay." R didn't trust himself to say anything else.

The boy went back to his table dragging the chair over to his friend Combeferre, who sat down. The boy then began to address the group as a whole, forgetting about anyone who might be listening. R had finished his dinner by then, but was curious about what was happening so he stayed.

"Welcome to the ABC club, named for the jerk who complained about there being too many letters in the acronym LGBTQIA. I'm Enjolras. Tonight's topic is problems faced by poorer members of the community. Anyone want to start the conversation?" 

The group began talking. R could not keep track of who said what, they all spoke so quickly. When there was a pause, he decided to do something that he knew could make him look stupid. He gulped, then walked over while the kid in the tie was talking about how she thought therapy was too expensive for most families to afford. "Excuse me." he said once she was finished. "I don't mean to be rude, but if this is a club for LGBT people, why didn't you ask for people's pronouns?"

Enjolras was ashamed. He knew he had forgotten something, but was unsure what exactly it was until this stranger pointed it out. He felt foolish, and muttered "I forgot." His friends all seemed to comfort him, which made R even more angry than it should have. They went around saying their pronouns, and only Coufeyrac seemed thankful for R making them do so.

"I use he/him/his." Enjolras said, still blushing.

"Ey/em/eirs." said Courfeyrac. 

"He/him/his." said Combeferre. 

"She/her/hers." said Jehan.

"They pronouns, but I don't really give a shit." added the Eagle. 'What a dick of a name.' thought R. 'Bet they're the type who doesn't give a shit about anyone.' He had no reason to think these thoughts, but he liked berating other people. It made him feel superior, even though it was only him talking to himself.

"What about you, kid?" asked Enjolras to R. 

"Him, he, and his." R said not eloquently. He felt like this boy was making him unable to speak right.

"Do you care to join us?" Combeferre asked. R nodded and pulled his chair over. The conversation lasted until closing time. R didn't join in much, but the thoughts had been silent for the first time in a while. It felt nice, he thought when he walked back to his car. It was nice to have friends. He thought of them when he drifted off to sleep in the backseat of his car.


End file.
